EconMusic Conference Coverage

A guest post from fellow ArtistDish podcaster Patrick Wooward

The EconMusic event held at the LA Times building on Thursday brought together some good thinkers and business people in the digital music space.  The familiar topics were covered: mobile, artist/fan connections, and more.

'What's up with subscription?' came up quite a bit during the day.  It was discussed on both of the day's panels, and the consensus was that it has a place in the future, but it's questionable whether today is the right time. 

MySpace music's Courtney Holt talked about their initiatives calling it a big undertaking with so many different paths to go down.  He mentioned that giving the data MySpace Music is collecting back to the artist is one of his goals.  He would not comment on figures or CPMs.  He did say that leveraging the value of the data being collected about an artist or band and their fan's behavior is on the horizon for the service as well. 

David Ring, Cory Ondrekja, Michael Spiegelman, and Chris Stephenson shared a panel.  Word of the day was 'experimentation'.  Everyone seemed to be taking different approaches in how they are choosing to experiment.  Cory talked about his method of using EMI's front page as a sandbox to test what works for consumers and what doesn't.  David stressed that nothing is off the table today.  Michael echoed this by saying that in a transition period like this one, it is only natural to experiment.  Yahoo Music's approach of making all music easily playable on the web with the Goose player, to a content owner's approach like that of EMI by creating a central portal for discovery represent the wide spectrum of approaches.   

Fred Croshal was interviewed about the methods that Croshal Entertainment Group uses to market artists.  Besides being very upbeat and energetic about the future, he seems to be operating in a way that matches the environment.  Using what is available whether it be traditional or new methodologies is how Fred approaches a new project.  He is "bullish on the music industry."  His group has had some great success with the artists they've taken on.

The topic of mobile belonged to the last panel.  Tom Conrad from Pandora talked a little bit about Pandora's growth on the iPhone.  It was mentioned by the panel, and I agree, that the majority of mobile product offerings are ancillary to internet based offerings.  In the US there aren't any really amazing offerings that shadow internet based ones.  Although, I do think that subscription services might find an outlet in mobile devices. 

The point was made that in the rest of the world, music and mobile are coupled very well.  Nokia's Comes With Music offering was brought up and Asia's mobile music habits were also referenced.  Mobile music has been a topic of discussion for some time but it seems that some are really starting to go after it.  I listened to WMG's earnings call and Edgar Bronfman and team seemed to be energetic about exploring the mobile music space.  Bronfman also referenced how the rest of the world is coupling music with mobile devices.  Maybe mobile music will be a real business in the U.S. someday, but I'm sure we'll see domestic labels giving more attention to it overseas.